


Loving You (It's All I Can Do)

by rosydoky



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Roommates/Housemates, Falling In Love, Fluff, Getting Together, Happy Ending, Light Angst, Love Language, M/M, Miscommunication, Soulmates, kinda i guess, side haoshua, side jigyu, they r just softies...
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-16
Updated: 2018-10-16
Packaged: 2019-08-03 05:12:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16319792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosydoky/pseuds/rosydoky
Summary: This is how it starts, clay beneath their fingernails and instant connection.





	Loving You (It's All I Can Do)

**Author's Note:**

> uhhhh fuck... haha hey :) back from my little hiatus kinda :) it's been a rough month but i really like how this turned out! hopefully will be back into the swing of things soon.  
> anyways this is kinda something i've been thinking about for a long while... bernon love language... he is such a loving boy just doesn't know how to express it in the most obvious ways! but it's there! anyways i love benrnon  
> twitter: @boolesbian

“I think my heart could find you in a crowded room with all the lights turned off. I think I could find you across the deepest oceans, over the tallest mountains, through the darkest woods. My heart was made to search for yours every second they aren’t beating together. I was made for loving you. I believe that, do you?” 

Vernon looks at the boy sitting in front of him, his face is flushed the perfect shade of pink and it doesn’t even clash with the bright peach color of his hair. He looks like the sunset, wrapped in a dark purple scarf that covers his chin, lower lip jutting out against the fabric. He doesn’t look nervous, and Vernon wishes he could be as brave as him, wishes he could bare his heart and soul to him in return. The words fail to reach his lips when he tries to tell him what he’s thinking. 

* * *

_ “I was so lost without you, thank you for helping me find myself.” _

It starts in a ceramics class, oddly enough. 

Mingyu and Jihoon go on a lot of interesting dates, because Jihoon is easily bored and Mingyu is endlessly adventurous. If they aren’t staying at home hogging the couch and watching everything on Netflix, they’re out and about on whatever odd date spot they found on google. 

Sometimes, when Vernon is looking extra pathetic, they make him go with them. 

It’s not that Vernon doesn’t have any other friends, he has plenty. It’s just sometimes,  _ he’d  _ rather hog the couch, lounging around in his favorite t-shirt, hugging a comically large bowl of popcorn. He doesn’t see anything wrong with that, but after the third day of his antics, his roomates do. 

So they surprise him with a seat in some ceramics class they found on Yelp, and he can’t say no because they’ve already paid for it, and he can use some fresh air anyways. Sure, he’s absolute ass at anything to do with visual arts, but he decides it might be fun. 

He doesn’t expect the instructor's assistant to be a very cute boy with round cheeks and a shy smile, so he’s pleasantly surprised when the boy, Seungkwan, introduces himself. There’s a warmth radiating off of him, Vernon thinks, but it could also just be that he sat too close to the kilns. The class begins and Seungkwan gets whisked away immediately by an elderly lady who doesn’t know how to open her clay package. 

Vernon, of course, has no idea what he’s doing.

Mingyu is busy sitting behind Jihoon at the pottery wheel, reenacting a scene from some cheesy romance movie Jihoon is fond of. Vernon pouts a bit to himself, because his best friends just dragged him out of the house only to make him miserable with their disgusting coupley displays of affection. 

“Do you need help?” a soft voice says from behind him, and a hand grazes his shoulder. 

The warmth definitely isn’t coming from the kilns, but it’s living on the apples of Vernon’s cheeks now. 

He looks down at his blob of too wet clay, then back up at Seungkwan with a smile he’s hoping isn’t too cheesy. 

“Yeah, probably,” he admits, giggling a bit at the mess he’s made in front of him. Part of him is kind of glad he’s so bad at this, because at least he’s gained the attention of the cute pottery assistant. 

“I’m going to be honest,” Seungkwan sighs, plopping down in the seat next to him, his knees bumping against Vernon’s own, “I don’t know what I’m doing either.” 

Vernon stares at him for a second, fully expecting him to laugh and say,  _ “just kidding! I’m a professional!”  _ but Seungkwan doesn’t, so Vernon laughs instead. 

“Stop,” Seungkwan hushes him, but he’s smiling at him, and it makes Vernon’s heartbeat quicken just a little. He likes making Seungkwan smile, he decides. 

“I’m only doing this because I couldn’t find anything else,” Seungkwan whispers, pretending to fix Vernon’s mess, “I don’t know  _ anything  _ about ceramics, but I can usually get by with a little bit of false confidence and acting like I know what I’m doing.” 

“So why are you telling me this?” 

“Because I like you,” Seungkwan shrugs, as if it’s the most obvious answer in the world. He seems so sure of himself, as if they hadn’t just met less than five minutes ago. Except it makes sense to Vernon, because he likes Seungkwan too. 

“Oh, okay,” he says simply, because he doesn’t trust himself to say anything else. The blush high and bright on his cheeks gives away enough. 

“Okay?” Seungkwan giggles, and if Vernon thought he liked making him smile, he had no idea how badly he wanted to make the other boy laugh over and over again. 

“Yeah,” Vernon nods, biting back a smile.

This is how it starts, clay beneath their fingernails and instant connection. 

Vernon doesn’t go home with a vase that day, but the number scrawled neatly on a slip of paper burns a hole in his pant pocket anyways. 

  
  


_ “Sometimes it feels like loving you is the only thing I’m doing right.”  _

Vernon’s stomach churns when he sees the way Seungkwan’s eyes are searching his own, pleading for something that he can’t quite express. It makes his heart lurch and his hands tremble, he isn’t sure what to do. 

“Kwannie, talk to me,” he tries in a quiet voice, lacing his fingers through Seungkwan’s own. His hands aren’t warm as they usually are, they’re cold and clammy and shaking harder than Vernon’s. He squeezes them, hoping he’s conveying the right things. 

“I’m sorry,” Seungkwan sniffs back, turning his head as tears start to fall. He’s ashamed, Vernon realizes, and his heart breaks a little more. He wants Seungkwan to feel comfortable, wants him to find solace in Vernon’s arms. He doesn’t know how to make that happen, but he keeps trying anyways. 

“Don’t apologize, baby,” he soothes, using his free hand to push back the hair that’s clinging to Seungkwan’s forehead, then gently swiping away his tears with his thumb. Seungkwan’s bottom lip wobbles and he knows more tears are to come, so he brings him in closer, wraps his arms around him, hopes he can’t hear the rapid beating of his heart. He wants to be strong for him, because Seungkwan is strong for everyone always. 

“I’m just so overwhelmed,” he lets out a choked sob, burying his face into the junction between Vernon’s neck and shoulder. He just holds him there, lets him cry and babble about how hard school and work have been. He doesn’t say anything, because he thinks Seungkwan just needs someone to listen, and he doesn’t know what he’d say anyways. 

The sobs that shake his body stop, but Vernon continues to hold him anyways. He traces hearts onto his back with his fingers, hums a song he doesn’t really know under his breath. Seungkwan comes up shortly after he stops shaking, raising his hands to cup Vernon’s face. They’re warm again, and it makes Vernon smile. 

“Thank you,” he says, and his voice is raspy from crying, and his eyes are puffy and red. Tears stain his cheeks and there's a bit of snot running down his philtrum. 

Vernon thinks he’s beautiful, so he kisses him. 

 

_ “You make me feel like things are going to be okay, you are the piece of me that has been missing all along.”  _

He drums his fingers against the steering wheel, Seungkwan hates when he does that, especially when he’s not on beat with whatever song he has blaring through his speakers. He says it’s  _ distracting  _ and  _ unnecessary when you have me here to sing to you and hold your hand.  _

But Vernon does it subconsciously, a nervous habit he can’t quite shake. 

Seungkwan isn’t here to stop him anyways. 

Seungkwan is on his way to the airport, about to catch the next plane home to Jeju. 

Vernon is in traffic, drumming his fingers against his steering wheel, begging the universe to let him catch his boy before it’s too late. He isn’t trying to stop him from going, because this trip has been planned for months. He’s trying to stop him from leaving without him, because that was the plan since the start. 

The fight was stupid, their first ever  _ real  _ fight since they made their relationship “official”. To Vernon, labels didn’t matter much anyways. If you asked him, he’d say they’d been together for six months. If you asked Seungkwan, he’d say they’d been together for seven weeks and three days. 

Except now, he might say they aren’t together at all. Vernon doesn’t like to think about that possibility, so he shakes it out of his head and remains hopeful. 

He knows it’s his fault, he was the one that got last minute cold feet about meeting Seungkwan’s family. He doesn’t even know  _ why,  _ truthfully. He’d been looking forward to their week long getaway for months, but earlier that day something had stirred inside of him, an unfamiliar anxiety in the pit of his stomach. He was scared. 

Of course, he couldn’t effectively communicate that to Seungkwan, leaving the other boy to just assume Vernon didn’t want to go anymore. Vernon thinks miscommunication is the oldest, most tiring trope in the books, but apparently he isn’t above it anyways. 

He nearly misses his exit, thinking too hard about what he’s going to say and what he’s not going to say. Now more than ever he needs his brain and mouth to work together, piece together the words he needs to say, let Seungkwan know he loves him, he’s sorry, he was just scared, it was miscommunication. 

The anxiety curls in his stomach, he grips onto the steering wheel a little harder before he parks his car, runs into the terminal with nothing more than a small backpack and his boarding pass. He thinks in the movies the guy usually has a big speech prepared, professing their undying love for their romantic interest, but Vernon has nothing. He has his aching heart and eyes filled to the brim with tears he hasn’t let drop yet. He hopes that it’s enough. 

He spots Seungkwan at the Starbucks near their gate, of course, and for a moment he’s paralyzed. He realizes it’s not the best time for him to be ogling his boyfriend, not when he’s at risk for not even  _ having _ said boyfriend anymore, but he can’t help himself. Seeing him standing there in line for his third caffeinated beverage of the day, glowing and warm and bright, all the things Vernon had always needed in his life, he knows he can’t lose him now. Losing Seungkwan means losing a piece of himself that he’s only just found. 

He slows down his pace, walks up to Seungkwan as he speaks to the barista, takes out his credit card, and pays for his coffee. 

Seungkwan turns to him quickly, eyes widening and smile dropping when he realizes it’s Vernon standing there, and not some kind stranger. Vernon’s heart breaks a little, because in any other circumstance, his smile would double in size. 

“I can pay for my own coffee,” he sniffs, fishing his own card out of his pocket. 

Vernon just sighs, swats away Seungkwan’s wrist, and insists on paying. Seungkwan gives in fairly easily, he did just quit his job at the Ceramics Castle. 

Seungkwan receives his coffee and rushes off ahead of Vernon, head held high, shoulders braced. He’s being defensive, putting up walls to defend his soft heart. 

“Kwan…” Vernon starts, jogging up beside him, “Kwan, slow down.” 

“I have a plane to catch,” Seungkwan says simply, not even turning to look at Vernon. He sees the tears welling in his eyes anyways. 

“I do too, in an hour, please just slow down so we can talk.” 

“What is there to say?” Seungkwan stops in his tracks, and Vernon thinks that a busy corridor in an airport isn’t exactly the best place to do this, but beggars can’t be choosers, “you know I was excited for this trip, and I thought you were too, but I’m not going to force you to do something you clearly have no interest in. Just go home,” he sighs, and starts to walk away again.

Vernon catches his arm.

“I was scared,” he breathes out, and he realizes he’s shaking as he grips Seungkwan’s arm softly, “I’m still scared, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want this.” 

“What are you scared of?” Seungkwan asks, and Vernon can’t help but be a little jealous, because it seems like all of this comes so easy to him, like someone gave him an instruction manual before he met Vernon. He doesn’t think it’s fair sometimes, especially not for Seungkwan. He doesn’t think it’s fair that Vernon can’t express how much he loves him like Seungkwan does. He loves him so much, loves him with every piece of him, but he is never sure if that’s enough.

“Losing you,” Vernon closes his eyes, “I’m fucking terrified of losing you.” 

Seungkwan must understand, must somehow feel everything Vernon is trying to tell him in that moment, because he takes him in his arms. Vernon thanks the universe for making a boy who understands him better than he does himself, and curses it for not making him as easy to love as Seungkwan. 

“You have me,” Seungkwan whispers into his chest, “you always have me.” 

 

_ “I never believed in soulmates until I met you.”  _

Seungkwan is bored. 

Vernon knows Seungkwan is bored because he’s bouncing his leg and pouting, arms crossed as he stares at the television in Vernon’s messy bedroom. He never  _ says  _ he’s bored, because he’s stubborn and doesn’t like to come off as whiny, but Vernon knows him well, knows how to read him even when he doesn’t say anything. 

“Okay, what do you want to do?” Vernon asks, rising from his bed and standing in front of Seungkwan, hands on his hips. 

“What do you mean?” 

“You’re bored, Seungkwan,” Vernon laughs, “so what do you want to do? Go to the park? The movies? Mingyu and Jihoon should be home soon, we can go to dinner?” 

Seungkwan’s face splits into a smile, “you know me so well, sunshine.”

Vernon’s face heats up at the use of his cheesy nickname, in front of any of their friends he’d lie and say he hates it. Maybe he would hate it, if anyone else but Seungkwan had given it to him, but coming out his mouth it sounds like the sweetest word he’s ever known. He wants to be Seungkwan’s sunshine always.

“I don’t want to hang out with Mingyu and Jihoon right now, they’re disgusting,” Seungkwan scrunches up his nose, “plus, I want to just be with you.” 

The butterflies in Vernon’s stomach flutter, he doesn’t think they’ll ever stop. 

“Can we go to the pet store?” Seungkwan’s eyes brighten, and his lower lip juts out as if he needs to plead. As if Vernon wouldn’t follow him anywhere. 

He’s not sure when they started going to the pet store as a date, but Seungkwan loves it and would choose walking around the store holding hands and pointing out there favorite animals over any sort of fancy dinner or extravagant plan. They’re both simple like that, they don’t need much more than each other and some cute animals. 

“When we live together, can we get a bunny?” Seungkwan asks, feeding his finger through the wired cage that holds a floppy eared rabbit, clearly ignoring the sign above that reads: _ Do not touch, may bite!  _

He cooes at the rabbit like it’s a baby, and he looks so pleased with his new friend, Vernon nearly offers to buy him the animal right then. 

“Let’s move in together,” Vernon says instead, the words come out fast and intense, because he’s just realized in the middle of a pet store that he wants to build a life with Boo Seungkwan. 

Seungkwan looks at him, smiles bright, and nods. 

 

_ “You are home.”  _

The first few weeks in their new apartment they order pizza nearly every night. They sit on the hardwood floor of their sparsely furnished home (they don’t have a dining table yet) and eat shitty pizza and drink cheap wine. They fill the empty walls with laughter and Seungkwan’s loud singing, they hold hands any chance they get. They live in bliss. 

But after the twelfth night of eating pizza, both of them physically recoil at the thought of purchasing another greasy, cheesy disc. 

“We need to cook,” Seungkwan sighs as he plops down onto their thrifted couch beside Vernon, “we’re like, real adults now. We need to make adult food.”

“So you’re tired of pizza to then?” Vernon hums, not looking up from the document he’s translating. 

“I just think we should be proper adults!” Seungkwan exclaims, ever stubborn as always. 

“Okay,” Vernon laughs, closing his laptop and looking over at Seungkwan who’s staring at him like an expectant puppy, “let’s cook something. We can invite Mingyu and Jihoon over.” 

Seungkwan scrunches up his nose, “if you only invite them over, Mingyu will make fun of whatever we cook. He thinks he’s  _ so  _ good at cooking. The only thing he knows how to make is spaghetti bolognese!” 

Vernon nods in agreement, Mingyu probably would make fun of whatever dish they served, but he’d probably have reason to as well, “okay, invite Joshua and Minghao over too, then.” 

Seungkwan’s smile widens, “oh, this is going to be like our first ever dinner party! We’re like  _ real  _ adults!”

“You keep saying that as if we both aren’t 25.”

“You know what I mean,” Seungkwan sighs dramatically, “we’re like, doing things! We’re going to cook dinner together, that’s the epitome of domesticity!” 

Vernon just smiles and nods, because he agrees. 

Cooking dinner turns out to be harder than either of them anticipated, mostly because neither of them have cooked anything more advanced that cup noodles and rice their entire life. And they definitely don’t have any experience in cooking  _ eggplant parmesan  _ which doesn’t even sound appetizing to Vernon, but Seungkwan is adamant on his plans to use this recipe. 

They burn the noodles, somehow, and the eggplant comes out mushy and wet. 

“We can’t feed this to Mingyu,” Seungkwan whines, “he’ll never let it go!”

Vernon looks at the clock, and then back at Seungkwan, then back to their plates of awful mistakes. It reminds him of the first time they met, when Seungkwan tried to help him fix his ceramic vase. 

“Let’s just order takeout,” Vernon says quickly, “we can order eggplant parmesan from the place we get pizza from, they’ll never know the difference.”

Seungkwan stares at him for a second, and Vernon thinks he might argue with him, but he just lets out a huff of air and nods, dialing the number to their favorite Italian restaurant. 

Dinner goes smoothly, they hide all the containers their food came in and no one suspects a thing, they even get compliments from Mingyu on their work. Seungkwan and Vernon share knowing smiles and accept them with enthusiasm. 

They fill their slightly more furnished apartment with laughter and banter between their friends, they play board games and listen to Seungkwan’s playlist of girl group songs, Minghao dances to every single one of them after his third glass of wine. 

Seungkwan talks their ears off about the cute bunny Vernon is going to buy him once their settled in, and Vernon just giggles and nods his head, leaning into Seungkwan and pecking him on the lips, because he just can’t help himself sometimes. Their friends just smile at them, they don’t jeer or pretend to be grossed out. They know they are home now, not because they moved in, but because they moved together. 

* * *

“I do,” he whispers, and he means it.

**Author's Note:**

> yea i know there's security at airports but bag checks ARE NOT romantic. fuck vernon having to wait in that long ass line. he has a BOYFRIEND to go love.


End file.
